Ernst: For some homeless, street-corner solicitation is a real job

While Sarasota has beefed up its rules to prohibit asking for money at roadway intersections, action aimed primarily at the homeless, not all cities have taken that approach.

On the East Coast, in Broward, Dade and Palm Beach counties, homeless men and women are permitted to stand on street corners and solicit donations. There is a slight distinction from outright panhandling in that they offer a product — a newspaper called The Homeless Voice.

Teams of four to five work the corners all day. They spend their nights at the Homeless Voice Shelter in Hollywood, which receives part of the proceeds.

“This is their job,” says Richard Shelby, who works at the shelter. He says some vendors, “the real hustlers,” he calls them, bring in as much as $30,000 to $40,000 a year. The money supports the shelter, the work teaches responsibility, and the news informs readers about the local homeless community.

“We have a lot of followers. People call and ask when the next paper is coming out,” Shelby says.

The Homeless Voice publishes once a month. Some stories have bylines. Many do not. Each edition, about 12 pages in newsprint format, contains a mix of national and local articles. “Sometimes a client is here for a while and passes away, and we will write a story about them,” Shelby says.

A short story on the front page of a recent edition discussed the work of in-house shelter medics, all homeless, who apparently have taken first-responder courses enabling them to apply oxygen and deal with overdoses.

“We have saved many people with our yearly training,” the story said. “When most people think the homeless are worthless bums look at these homeless people save a man’s life. Way to go Homeless.

“You think this is great you should see them respond to major accidents on the highway in front of the shelter (Federal Highway). The community does not like having a homeless shelter in the area but when one of them gets in a car accident it does make them think different.”

Maybe The Homeless Voice has the same effect on its readers.

Shelby says there might be as many as 100 similar enterprises across the country. That does not mean it would be a good fit for Sarasota, but it might be something to consider in one form or another.

Initiative coasting

Maybe it’s natural that a petition drive for nonpartisan elections would start off in neutral.

Last month, an organization called the Public Interest Coalition announced it would collect signatures to place on the ballot a referendum to make all of Sarasota County’s elected offices nonpartisan.

Since then, nothing. Well, no news at least.

Out of the more than 14,000 signatures it will take to get on the ballot, the initiative has collected only a few hundred.

Not to worry, says organizer Bill Zoller of Sarasota. “The summer is so hard,” he says. “People are on vacation and you can’t get anyone to meetings.” So, the group has settled for letting the signatures trickle in through the mail or through a website at openourelections.com.

Zoller says a more concerted effort will kick off in the fall when supporters will man tables at places such as the library and farmers markets, among other strategies.

Meanwhile, the coalition has reassessed its target date to get on the ballot. Instead of aiming for March, it’s now looking to the primary in August or the general election in November.